Black Rose

An "Uncle Walter" rose, from our garden.

The Last Rose of Summer

I made this image earlier today in our garden, where this rose is blooming - the last of the year, I suspect.

I Beg Your Pardon...

Its been a while since I've posted a mono image - there was a time when I desaturated most of my images. Anyway, this one has been hanging around for a while and as I've hit a bit of hiatus, I thought that I'd process and post it.

The rose was orange, btw. 

Even More Beastly

Another mini-beast in our garden.

Time For Tea

Yet another image of a rose. This one is a tea rose, which we rescued from the garden of my father's house and is now hanging on in there in our garden.

Apologia

Another image that I'd been saving for a rainy day. Apologies for posting yet another image of a rose.

Rational Rose

Another image from the Singleton Park set and another software developer's pun.

End of the Year Review, 2013

Its that time of year when its customary to look back - and forwards - so here goes.

I've made a few images of which I'm quite proud this year, perhaps five or six. Some of them are included in the montage above.

I took a different approach to my flower photography, eschewing the shallow depth of field and 'environmental' backgrounds (i.e. whatever happened to be in-shot) of previous years, opting for plain white, or occasionally black. I even put my pretensions aside and produced some colour images. In the process, I think that I've moved things forwards.

On the other hand, my landscape photography almost ceased to produce anything usable, with a late revival just before Christmas at Shapwick.

I also tried, without much success, to document events in Liverpool, as we cleared my father's house of his belongings.

Regarding this blog, I wrote one or two posts that I'm pleased with - the one about SAW, the series about Sony's strategy spring to mind - and a whole lot of pointless verbiage besides.

So, what about next year - 2014, that is?

Well, for one thing, I'm going to stop writing text to post with my images just because I feel I have to - if I have an image to post and nothing to write, then I won't write anything, aside from a short description of the image itself.

I'll try to do some more landscape photography, and get my light tent out more often.

But what about the flower photography? Have I taken that as far as I can? It actually forms the majority of what I do at the moment. My instinct is that I haven't, there's more mileage in it next year, but I really don't know what form that will take. I guess that I've a couple of months to figure that one out.

PS: Coming soon - the Williams Music Awards 2013.

Goodnight, Rose

Last weekend we were back in Liverpool for the pre-Christmas visit. On the Sunday evening, as we left the city to return home, our car was written off in an accident, which left us all uninjured, but I've been busy sorting the fallout, hence the hiatus in posts.

Anyway, this really is the last image of a rose that I'm going to post this year.

This particular bloom is the last on a patio rose that we rescued from my father's house. It was given to him as a birthday present a couple of years ago, ostensibly from our son, so he looked after it rather more assiduously than most of the plants in his garden.

A couple of months ago we hired a transit van to clear the last of the stuff from the house and we manhandled this bush, in its pot, into the back and brought it back to Somerset. Its now round the front of the house, standing next to my father's workbench, for which we've no space indoors.

For the record, the title of this post is taken from a Ryan Adams track which appears on his "Easy, Tiger" album.

Postmodernism Ate My Hamster

Postmodernism has a lot to answer for. 

Ever read a novel in which the main protagonist is a blocked writer? That's post-modern mental ju-jitsu for you. Suffering from writers block? Then write about writer's block. If I have nothing to write about in this post, then I'll write about having nothing to write about and hey presto, we have a post written without having to find anything to say.

Eating your own smoke, as engineers like to call it.

Anyway, an image of another one of those roses that were hanging on in there last Sunday.

The Last Rose of Summer

I seem to remember writing, in a recent post, something to the effect that I'd finished with flower photography for this year.

Well, I was wrong. 

Last Sunday, I noticed that three of our rose bushes were still flowering, with one bloom on each. The weather was dull and overcast, damp and cold, but perfectly still - so ideal for photography. I headed outside with my camera in the late afternoon, when the light was softening towards sunset.

The above is one of three or four (or maybe five) decent images that I made, which I'll post over the next week or two. They feature the rather ragged, fag-end of the year flowers that are left just before the first real frosts arrive.

The title is a literary reference for a change, to a rather drippy poem by Thomas Moore, but it seems appropriate.

I Speak My Brains

Over the next few posts, I'll record some of my thoughts about the direction that Sony Imaging is taking, then we can determine the level of my prognosticative powers. To start with, some reflections on the designation of the new full frame cameras announced last week.

First, a quick recap of my understanding of Sony’s naming conventions. 

A + 3 digits = DSLR; 

A + 2 digits = DSLT; 

A + 1 digit = full frame(?) mirror-less(?); 

The higher the number, the higher the spec of the camera, with A9** being the top of any particular range.

Confusingly, the same number doesn't designate cameras at the same price point in different ranges. And I don't get why two very different cameras - the A7 and A7r - are given similar designations. And how are upgrades to be designated? With the three and two digit nomenclature, this was easy, but with a single digit you have to go to mark numbers, which would be a new departure for Sony.

Whatever, designating the new cameras as A7s leaves room in the range for a higher spec A9 - and an A9r? -  model. What would that be like? A full frame, 48 mega-pixel mirror-less model, perhaps?

Anyway, the image above is the final one from the last batch that I made prior to my Sigma lens breaking. Its another of a rose from our garden - I was experimenting with black backgrounds at this point, which I've get to return to.

Sony Day

Yesterday was a big day for Sony's Imaging division. They announced three new cameras, amongst them not one, but two full frame e-mount models - the third being the RX10, which amounts to a £1,000 bridge camera with a big sensor.

Anyway, back to the e-mount cameras, the A7 and the A7r. The two share the same body, although the internals are quite different. The first has a 24 mega-pixel sensor with a hybrid autofocus system, but the second is a 36 mega-pixel monster, optimised  - if you believe Sony - for image quality, without a low-pass optical filter to improve resolution further.

Along with the cameras, five full frame - designated FE - Zeiss (aka expensive) lenses were announced, with more to come next year.

Its interesting to note that, despite the fact that the A7s are effectively NEX cameras, they attract an Alpha designation. Apparently, Sony are bringing the two brands together. Now, I find the Sony camera range confusing enough as it is and I'm a fairly assiduous Sony watcher. In my view the whole range is likely become a hotchpotch of a-mount and e-mount cameras that will be incomprehensible to a disinterested observer.

Despite all this and my previous ranting on the subject, I find myself really wanting an A7r. Body only, one of these babies comes in around £1,700. And I'd need a new lens kit, so the whole lot would set me back the better part of four grand. So, that's not going to happen then.

Above is another image of a rose that I made with my now rather sorry looking Alpha 77. Enjoy, if you can bear to be without the additional twelve mega-pixels.

Cold Roses

Another rose from our garden. I've posted images of roses from this bush before - the flowers are dark red, probably my favourite blooms in the whole garden. 

The bush is quite leggy, so some of the flowers are above head height and difficult to photograph. I'd have been happier if the camera had been level with this one rather than below, resulting in the slight upward angle that I've had to use, but needs must and all that.

My previous post, "Acuf Rose" was named after an Uncle Tupelo track, off their final album "Anodyne". The track took its name from the music publishing partnership of the same name and features the lyric "Name me a song that everybody knows / I'll bet you it belongs to Acuf Rose." 

This post takes its title from a double album released by another alt-country luminary.

Acuf Rose

After the ranting of my previous post, back to some actual imagery.

This is, obviously, of a rose from our garden. We have several bushes, this particular one is pink. I struggled to make decent images of these flowers all summer and ended with only a couple that are passable, of which this is one.

"I Remember California" took its title from a track by REM, from their major label début album "Green". This post title has a very general musical connection, but it has been used as a track title as well.

The Name of The Rose

"Peace" apparently.

I've been trying to make images of the roses all summer, and failing. This is the first that's been worth posting.